Barak: Israel tracking Hezbollah arms transfers

Shi'ite organization trying to move advanced weaponry from Syria to Lebanon to prevent its capture by Assad opposition.

Defense Minister Ehud Barak 311.
(photo credit:Marc Israel Sellem)

Israel is taking precautions and is tracking the transfer of arms from Syria to Lebanon, Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Tuesday, amid concern that Hezbollah is trying to move advanced weaponry out of Syria.

Touring the Golan Heights, Barak said that the Syrian missile test on Sunday was conducted out of fear and that Bashar Assad’s regime would fall in the near future. Israel is concerned that Hezbollah is planning to move advanced weaponry it has been storing in Syria to Lebanon to prevent it from being captured by opposition groups which are fighting against Assad.

“It is now quiet here but a few days ago just a few hundred kilometers northeast of here we saw the launching of different rockets,” Barak said on the sidelines of an exercise of the Golani Brigade which he attended together with IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz. “It could be that the fire was part of a demonstration of capabilities but it is more about fear and distress than about confidence.”

On
Sunday, the Syrian military test fired a Scud-B ballistic missile and
other short range rockets. Syria is believed to have several hundred
Scud missiles as well as a number of Scud-D models, the longest-range
ballistic missile in its arsenal.

Barak said that while he hoped the border would remain quiet, the IDF,
he said, was prepared for any development on the Syrian and Lebanese
fronts.